Beating the Bounds in Penge and Lee

On this day in 1881, a 'beating the bounds' procession took place in Penge. As reported in The Beckenham Journal and Penge and Sydenham Advertiser, Wednesday, June 1, 1881:

'The ancient custom of beating the bounds was observed with all due ceremony in Penge on Thursday the 26th being Ascension Day. Some 18 boys from various schools in the Hamlet, with willow wands, to which were attached ribbons and bells, started from the Vestry Hall shortly after 10 o'clock in the morning, under the direction of Mr C.W. Dommett, the vestry Clark, and Mr A. Wilson, assistant overseer, many of the vestry men being also present and joining in the procession. The party was followed by a wagonettte containing ladders etc required to surmount some of the obstacles which were encountered. At important points of the boundary the custom of "bumping" was duly observed, to the great delight of the boys, if not of some of the elders. During the journey the party availed themselves of refreshments kindly provided for them at the residences of Dr Gibbes and Messrs T. Bugler and W. Matthews. Fortunately the weather was fine, or the day would have been far from pleasant for those concerned. A number of the overseers, vestry men, and others interested in the hamlet met at the vestry Hall in the evening and partook of an excellent dinner'.

 

Beating the bounds processions took place in many parishes until the 19th century. According to folklorist Steve Roud they involved 'walking around the boundaries of the parish both to check that there had been no encroachments or illegal building, and to make sure that everyone knew the extent of the parish in detail... In the days before accurate maps, it was essential that the knowledge of boundaries was passed on to younger generations... The participants often carried flexible wands, and when they reached a particular boundary marker they would literally beat it with their sticks. In many cases, boys were whipped with the wands at each stone, or bumped on them, or even held upside down. Sometimes they were encouraged to run on ahead to find the next marker and the first one there was rewarded. It was also thought important, even perhaps legally binding, that the whole of the boundary be followed, at least by a representative. Boys were therefore useful to scale walls, crawl through hedges, wade through ponds – wherever the official boundary took them' (Steve Roud, London Lore, 2008).

 

Roud also mentions that Penge was 'for centuries a detached part of Battersea parish given to them in the year 957'. The parish records of St Mary's Church, Battersea, record officials 'agoeing the bownds of the parish at Penge' in 1661 and on other occasions.

 

Beating the Bounds processions have been revived in a number of places in recent years as a way of celebrating local history and geography. In Penge, there is a  Beating the Bounds walk on Sunday 4 June starting at 2.30 pm from  Alexandra Nurseries, 56B Parish Lane, SE20 7LJ. In recent years there have also been Beating the Bounds processions in Nunhead, and in Lee where last month (April 22) Dacre Morris and Blackheath Morris beat the bounds of the old Dacre estate.

 

Dacre Morris beating the bounds April 2017

(photo from Dacre Morris facebook page)

 

 

 

 

 

Recent street art: Captain America, Sweets and Ganesha

New piece by Artful Dodger on Peckham Road by Southamton Way junction, a Trump era lamentation featuring Captain America and referencing Simon and Garfunkel's Mrs Robinson too 'Where have you gone, Captain America? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you'. The same artist painted the nearby Carrie Fisher mural

'Money can't buy love, but it can buy sweets, I like sweets' by Dope, on Penge High Street.

Not sure if a statue of Hindu deity Ganesha counts as a street art, but its on Tooley Street SE1 outside the new Lalit Hotel.

Did you ever have a dream?

There aren't many songs that mention Penge to my knowledge, let alone ones by great songwriters. But in 1967, on the B-side of his single 'Love you till Tuesday', David Bowie recorded a song called 'Did you ever have a dream?'. Not one of his best maybe, but that little corner of SE London does get a mention.

...And did you ever have a dream or two?
Have you ever woken up one day
With the feeling that you'd been away?
If the girl that you dreamed of last night
Had the same dream, in the very same scene
With the very same boy, hold tight
It's a very special knowledge that you've got, my friend
You can travel anywhere with anyone you care
It's a very special knowledge that you've got, my friend
You can walk around in New York while you sleep in Penge
I will travel round the world one night
On the magic wings of astral flight
If you've got the secret, tell me do
Have you ever had a dream or two?
Have you ever had a dream or two?

(more Bowie in South London stuff at Transpontine)

Attempted Murder in Penge

I had the good fortune at the weekend to be invited to a party at the Magic Circle HQ near Euston, the home of stage magicians. Yes, there are shrines there for David Nixon, Ali Bongo and Tommy Cooper.


There's also a small museum with a fine collection of old posters. There's one from the Crystal Palace and this one: 'Illusions never before ATTEMPTED as thrilling as MURDER are being performed by the great Horace Goldin IN the Empire Theatre PENGE - all the week twice nightly'.


Horace Goldin (1873-1939), born Hyman Elias Goldstein, came to London via Lithuania and Nashville. Not sure when he was in Penge, but the Penge Empire opened in 1915.

Dancing in the Anerley Gardens

I came across this card in Southwark Local Studies archive, advertising dancing at Anerley Gardens in Penge. Anerley Gardens were open from 1841 to 1868, next to Anerley station, and featured a hotel, tearooms, a maze and a bandstand. Oddly Anerley is spelt as Anerly - presumably the spelling had not yet been standardised.

A contemporary visitor described Anerley Gardens as 'prettily disposed, with every imaginable device to make a visitor prolong his stay. The old Croydon Canal runs at the end of the grounds, and is kept well stocked with fish; there are few resorts more calculated than this to afford innocent recreation and healthy enjoyment' (Adams's Pocket descriptive guide to the environs of the metropolis).

Sorry about the quality, it's a scan of a photocopy of the original. The full text says: 'Admit Two to Anerly Gardens, Archibald Hinton. Dancing every Evening in the Gorgeous Al Fresco Rotunda. Fireworks by Jones of Camberwell. As the Gardens are so crowded on Mondays and Saturdays this Order will not be Admitted on those days. This Order is available Every Evening (except Mondays and Saturdays) until June 30th , and not after. Return Crystal Palace Tickets are available at the Anerly Station. Trains from London Bridge to Anerly Quarter past every Hour'.

Archibald Hinton was the owner of the Anerley Gardens from 1860, having previously been the proprietor of the Highbury Barn in Islington. The Anerley Arms pub was built on part of the site.

Nunhead to Crystal Palace walk

'On Saturday 31st January 'Walk London' invites you to a leisurely taster of the Green Chain Walks forthcoming extension from Nunhead to Crystal Palace . Generally it follows the disused railway line but diverts to make the most of local landscape, views and, places of interest. The walk is free of charge, starts at 11am outside Nunhead railway station and, is 6.5 miles long. Of course, you may break-off at any time. There are some steep slopes and muddy sections. We'll visit Nunhead Cemetery, One Tree Hill, The Walter Segal houses, Horniman Gardens , Sydenham Hill Woods nature reserve, the site of Upper Sydenham station and, Crystal Palace Park. We conclude at the Café near the Park's Penge Gate. The walk should take 3 or 4 hours and the Walk Leader will give a brief historical commentaries. Experts are welcome to correct him! You can see the route on the web here.'

Crystal Palace Fiction

The title story of Shena Mackay's new collection, The Atmospheric Railway, takes its name and some of its subject manner from a short-lived Victorian railway line in Crystal Palace (the author grew up in Blackheath and went to Kidbrooke school),

Crystal Palace magazine The Transmitter has identified a couple more novels set in that part of London. A recent one is Karen McLeod's In Search of the Missing Eyelash, set in Penge and Crystal Palace. Of greater vintage is The Young Visiters (sic) by Daisy Ashford, published in 1919 but apparently written by the author when she was 9 in 1890, a comic tale with much of the action set in Crystal Palace, or rather in the Crystal Palace.

BNP in South East London Update

Last night's post about the BNP membership list underestimated the number of members across South East London - the original version of the list was in lots of different sections and I missed some. Various other versions are out there now which are easier to search.

It now seems that there are 102 BNP members in the SE postcodes areas, a worrying number but my earlier point about their lack of significant presence in London remains. Yes Deptford is a BNP free zone, and there is only 1 each in New Cross and Walworth. Further out there are larger clusters though - particularly in Eltham. Complete breakdown is as folows:

SE1 (Bermondsey) - 5
SE2 (Abbey Wood) – 1
SE3 (Blackheath) - 6
SE4 (Brockley) -4
SE5 (Camberwell) – 6
SE6 (Catford) - 3
SE7 (Charlton) -2
SE8 (Deptford) – 0
SE9 (Eltham) – 17
SE10 (Greenwich) - 2
SE11 (Kennington) – 0
SE12 (Lee) – 1
SE13 (Lewisham) – 2
SE14 (New Cross) -1
SE15 (Peckham) – 5
SE16 (Rotherhithe) - 5
SE17 (Walworth) -1
SE18 (Woolwich/Plumstead) - 7
SE19 (Upper Norwood/Crystal Palace) - 4
SE20 (Anerley/Penge) - 6
SE21 (Dulwich) – 1
SE22 (East Dulwich) -2
SE23 (Forest Hill) – 6

SE24 (Herne Hill) – 3

SE25 (South Norwood) -5

SE26 (Sydenham) – 3

SE27 (West Norwood) -1

SE28 (Thamesmead) - 4

Not a lot of interesting detail in the list of local members, other than the fact that one SE18 member is Sean Pearson, who stood for the Conservatives in a 2006 local election in Greenwich Glyndon Ward and was until last year chair of the Swinton Circle - a group on the far right of the Tory Party (Malcolm Redfellow has more on this as well as some hilarious extracts from the list).

Some interesting as well as dubious comments to earlier post and also over at Brockley Central. One suggestion is that after the initial turmoil, the BNP might benefit from the fuss if they can present themselves as victims - there was a member on the news complaining about living in a 'fascist state' (oh my aching sides - read some history) - never mind the fact that it seems likely that the list was originally published by one of their own in a faction fight between wannabe fuhrers. The BNP are also getting lots of publicity, and will try and use the stories about teachers, police officers etc. to show that they are full of upright members of the community (actually there are only a handful of members named for any particular job).

There is some risk of this, and we certainly can't rely on the BNP continually shooting themselves in the foot. Still at least their opponents now know where to look out for them.

South London Ghost Trains

South London is not so well served by the London Underground as the other side of the river, so unsurprisingly it doesn't figure so strongly in the new book Haunted London Underground by David Brandon and Alan Brooke (History Press, 2008). Still there are a few spooky stories from the transpontine zone.

- The Crystal Palace tunnel runs between Gipsy Hill and Crystal Palace stations: 'This tunnel is reputed to be haunted. Many years ago a track-maintenance worker was run down and killed by a train in the tunnel. He was decapitated in the process. His ghost has been seen on many occasions wandering disconsolately around the tunnel'.

- Another tunnel on the short lived Victorian 'pneumatic railway' between Sydenham and Penge became the subject of an urban myth when the railway closed and the tunnel was bricked up - the legend was that an abandoned carriage had been bricked up inside with 'a grisly cargo of skeletal passengers'. The tunnel is thought to have been subsequently destroyed.

- Elephant and Castle Underground Station: staff 'have experienced the sounds of someone running towards them mainly when the station is closed but no one can be seen'. People travelling northbound on the Bakerloo Line from the Elephant have seen 'the sudden reflection of a ghost-like face staring back even though no one is sitting nearby'.

- The London Road depot of the Bakerloo Line, beneath street level by St Georges Circus/Lambeth North: staff have reported strange 'metallic-sounding tapping noises as if an old-fashioned wheeltapper was a work' and seen 'shadowy figures' with blurred edges 'passing hither and thither in the sidings'. 'Another apparition in the area is that of a nun, She is thought to have been connected with a nearby convent school'.

South London Gypsy History

June 2008 is apparently the first Gypsy, Traveller and Roma History Month. As part of it in Lewisham, the London Gypsy Orchestra are playing at Blackheath Halls on June 13th. So here's a bit of South London Gypsy History.

The Gypsy presence in South London is marked in some of the place names, most obviously Gipsy Hill. On a more derogatory note, South Norwood Hill was once known as Beggars Hill. From at least the 17th century to the mid-19th century, gypsies camped in in Norwood, Penge and and Croydon Common, paticularly in the summer months. A 1777 pantomime in Covent Garden was called 'The Norwood Gypsies'.

Margaret Finch, who died on 24 October 1740 at the age of 108 years, was known as the 'Queen of the Gypsies' and lived near the lower end of Gypsy Hill. Her fortune telling was a local attraction. She was buried in Beckenham Parish Church.


According to James Caulfield: 'The most remarkable was Margaret Finch, born at Sutton, in Kent; who, after travelling the whole of England in the double capacity of gipsy and thief, finally fixed her place of residence at Norwood. [She] adopted a habit, and afterwards a constant custom, of sitting on the ground with her chin resting on her knees, which caused her sinews to become so contracted, that she could not extend herself of change her position. [..] The singularity of her figure, and the fame of her fortune-telling, drew a vast concourse of persons from the highest rank and quality to that of the lowest class in life. Norwood, and the roads leading to it; on a fine sunday, resembled the scene of a fair; and, with the greatest difficulty only, could a seat or a mug of beer be obtained, at the place called the Gipsy-house." (Remarkable Persons, 1819)


Margaret was succeeded by her niece, 'Old Bridget, the Queen of the Gypsies' who died 6 August 1768 and was buried in Dulwich college burial ground. She was succeeded in turn by her niece Margaret. Another of her descendents, a Mrs Cooper, was one of the principal fortune tellers at Beulah Spa in the 19th century.

In the nineteenth century, 'the heights of Norwood were the holiday playground of the cockney tripper... Fortune telling by the gypsies was still one of the attractions" (1). Other attractions included the tea gardens at the Jolly Sailor (at the foot of South Norwood Hill), the White Swan, the White Hart (at the corner of Westow Street and Church Road) and the Windmill in Westow Hill. There were strawbery gardens in Beulah Hill and the famous Beulah Spa.

Elsewhere in South London, Samuel Pepys records in his diary for the 11 August 1688 that his wife went 'to see the Gypsies at Lambeth and had their fortunes told'. The church register for St Giles in Camberwell records that on June 2 1687, 'King and Queen of the Jepsies [gypsies], Robt. Hern and Elizabeth Bozwell' were married there (2)

The authorities cracked down on the Gypsy fortune tellers of South London in the late 18th century. In August 1797, police arrested thirty men, women and children in Norwood under the Vagrancy Act. In 1802, the Society for the Suppression of Vice brought charges against the Norwood fortune-tellers. 'Faced with police repression and subsequent enclosure of the Common, the fortune-tellers finally deserted Norwood' (3). Despite this there has been a traveller presence in South London down to the present.

Sources:
(1) Alan R. Warwick, The Phoenix Suburb: A South London Social History (London: Blue Boar Press 1972).
(2) William Harnett Blanch, The Parish of Camberwell (1875).
(3) Owen Davies, Witchcraft, Magic and Cultures, 1736-1951 (Manchester University Press, 1999)

Ziggy: Made in South London

David Bowie's origins in the suburbs of South London have been well-documented, but until recently I hadn't appreciated the specific role of Beckenham as the incubator of his legendary Ziggy Stardust look/persona.

According to 'Moonage Daydream - The Life and Times of Ziggy Stardust', it was while living at Haddon Hall, a decaying gothic mansion at 42 Southend Road, Beckhenham, that Bowie and friends put the finishing touches to Ziggy.

Bowie had the ground floor of the now-demolished house from 1969 to 1973, painting the ceilings silver and holding parties in the garden. The Ziggy outfits were stitched together at Haddon Hall under the direction of clothes designer Freddie Burrett (known as Burretti), and the songs that became The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars were rehearsed in an impromptu studio created under the stairs, as well as at the Thomas a Becket pub in the Old Kent Road.

The haircut was done by Suzi Fussey, who worked opposite the Three Tuns in Beckenham in the Evelyn Paget (now Gigante) hair salon - although she apparently copied the design from a magazine. The famous red and black platform boots were made by Stan Miller of Greenaway and Sons in Penge.

More on the Beckenham connection here.